It could be the argument for a sitcom. Not funny in real life when police is pointing a gun at you.

As a matter of fact I find most comments about Matlab here supportive. I actually do find Matlab to be a polished product, specially in the IDE and documentation part. In the end you use whatever saves you time, that's why most people that use Python have chosen Python: because of the libraries. I have personally found Matlab toolboxes quite simplistic for my own purposes. Most people, myself included, actually trust more that SW is used and deployed in the millions than any kind of support.

On the contrary I think that selective pressure is brutal. That's why everyone is trying to predict the future, because everyone knows that whatever they are doing today it's not gonna be valid in 20 years. Companies are constantly reinventing themselves, changing the way they do business. Internet has swallowed whole sectors of the economy and changed even the most traditional ones in what, 20 years?. Nobody would call you crazy if you said that in another twenty years Apple or Google have disappeared or are irrelevant.

Everybody notices that companies could function (even better actually) with something like 1/3 or less of their workforce. The other 2/3 are just doing BS work. Why? As with evolution there is really no objective, just some causes with an outcome. One of them is that companies don't know what to do with the money. They have all this people trying to figure out what to do next. Hence the hiring freezes in some companies right now with the economic downturn.

People underestimate consistently how complicated is to build reliable things, hardware or software. There is a world between "it works for me" and "it works for all"

The million dollar question.

More seriously, I love Pascal and similar. My first two books were Algorithms + Data Structures = Programs (Pascal) and Algorithms and Data Structures (Modula 2), both by Nicklaus Wirth.

General-purpose computing is a just a local optimum for profit extraction. Nevertheless it feels like guessing the correct answer for the wrong reasons. I welcome and embrace the FUD.

They give you strong science, economy and as a byproduct strong military.

> You often see a growing discontent among wealthy societies where everything is taken care of.

Like in Sri-Lanka, what a decadent society.

I don't think it's about believing the hype. It's about having a system put in place which encourages you to stop paying attention.

I do think there have been great improvements in car safety thanks to AI. My car self brakes if it detects a pedestrian while I'm in reverse. It flashes lights in my side mirrors if another vehicle passes by. I think those systems are safety first and if you buy a car they are the responsibility of the car maker and not the buyer. I don't think you would expect people checking the airplane model when taking a flight. It's the responsibility of the airline and the manufacturer.